I Know You By Heart
by Lana Aurelius
Summary: Songfic to the Eva Cassidy song of the same title. Relatively plotless and decidedly quite pointless too. Just something that wouldn't let me be. The Doctor knows his Rose by heart.


**Midnights in winter  
The glowing fire  
Lights up your face in orange and gold**

They'd rented a log cabin for the night up in the mountains of some quiet snowy planet. She'd expressed a childhood wish to stay in a place like that, so of course, he'd taken her. It had been a surprise that he'd been planning for some time.

It had taken him ages to organise. He wanted to do it properly, no fighting for justice or their own lives, just a nice relaxed little holiday, like the one she'd always craved. So he had to go through all of the necessary procedures. Booking and paying and all that. Not easy to do when one was saving the world three thousand years in the past and over three thousand million light years away.

But he'd managed it, just to see that delighted look on her face.

**I see your sweet smile  
Shine through the darkness  
Its line is edged in my memory**

They'd sat together, curled up on a fluffy rug in front of the fire, just being there, with each other, nothing else to distract from the happiness and joy they could acquire from each others company.

He'd said something, something fairly pointless and forgettable, but she must have found it sweet, because she'd given him that smile. That one smile that made everything worth it. That smile could give even the most broken and troubled man cause to live on and keep going.

People could make a religion out of that smile, make her a goddess and love and worship her, follow her for all of time, martyr themselves for her.

He'd do it, had done it in away. And would do it again, just so he could keep her a little longer.

**So I'd know you by heart**

He'd give anything for her to stay with him. He had a feeling that no amount of time would ever be enough. So he studied her, intently, never wanting to forget.

**Mornings in April  
Sharing our secrets  
We'd walk until the morning was gone**

Just there together, hand in hand, walking down a non-descript street in the middle of who knew where. It didn't matter, none of it did. But they were there, and they were together. Just the silly little things. The togetherness. They didn't need all of the danger and mayhem, not really. That followed them around, but they were quite content without it. Just the two of them, experiencing the universe together, the best and the worst in equal amounts. Always managing to find amazement and joy in the wondrous beauty of it all.

**We were like children  
Laughing for hours  
The joy you gave me lives on and on**

They'd laughed together forever, or so it had seemed. Talking about nothing and everything all at once. They didn't always understand what the other said, a joke, or a reference that could not be conceived of, but that was another thing that didn't matter.

They'd understood each other. And that was what mattered. Even things that they probably shouldn't understand, it was all there, unspoken but accepted. And that was their gift. Two friends, so in tune with each other in an inexplicable and wonderfully deep way.

**Cause I know you by heart**

They just knew, without knowing how. They just knew each other perfectly. They fit. Hand in hand. Hearts to heart. Souls entwined.

**I still hear your voice  
On warm summer nights  
Whispering like the wind**

She still spoke to him. Through him. His actions and words, what she'd have wanted. She'd made such an impression on him. If he felt lost and hopeless, he spoke her words with his mouth.

She was still soothing him and helping him.

**You left in Autumn  
The leaves were turning  
I walk down roads of orange and gold**

She'd always loved the Autumn. It was her favourite season. And it was quickly becoming his everything.

Ripped away from each other now. But still so incredibly together. If not more so than before.

Where words and actions are absent, spiritual echoes reside.

Her spirit must have created a duplicate of itself and implanted itself firmly within one of his hearts. Probably the one on the left. The one closer to humanity and therefore the one closer to her. He could feel her in there, like a voice at the back of his mind, becoming a part of him. She wasn't there with him, but at the same time she most assuredly was, looking at the wonderful colours on the trees.

Every memory created and every knowledge had been stored, leaving behind a semi-living imprint of everything she was and what she meant to him. She was still there, helping him through, shaping what he thought should be, and keeping him company when he felt alone.

She was his compassion. Every ounce of it he had left, he had because that is what she'd have wanted.**  
**

**I saw your sweet smile  
I heard your laughter  
You're still here beside me everyday**

When he lay on her bed, surrounded by her long lost junk and souvenirs of their expeditions, he felt close to her.

When he sat on a bench in a London park, eating salt and vinegary chips out of a paper bag with his fingers, he felt closer to her still.**  
**

When he stood up to the bad guys, breathing deeply, fire in his eyes, he felt like she was stood next to him. Her hand in his, her fire matching his own, her words promising freedom and justice.

And she was with him.

**Cause I know you by heart**

He remembered, he kept feeling, kept fighting, for her.

**Cause I know you by heart**

XXX

A.N. Sorry about this, I was listening to the song and just had to do something. It was in my head and driving me mad!


End file.
